The TSA has fired two security screeners in Denver, one male, one female, for allegedly carrying out an elaborate plot to grope the groins and buttocks of male flyers they deemed attractive.
According to The Denver Post, the male TSA agent would signal to his female colleague when a man he found attractive came though the body scanning machine.
After the body scanner detected that the flyer had a penis and was a man, the TSA agent would indicate to the machine that the passenger was a female. This triggered the machine to become confused over the crotch region of the flyer, at which time it would signal for a human to conduct a pat-down.
Security supervisor Chris Higgins, a TSA investigator, observed the conspiracy unfolding in real-time on Feb. 9 as a Southwest Airlines passenger entered the scanner.
What ensued was "a pat-down of the passenger's front groin and buttocks area with the palms of his hands, which is contradictory to TSA searching policy," he said.
"It's typically the back of the hand doing the pat down. But if they find something they can't resolve with the back of the hand, then they're going to use more intrusive measures," TSA expert and Metro State professor Jeff Price
told KUSA-TV.
The female TSA agent was soon questioned, and admitted to carrying out the plot at least 10 times.
The plot originally came to light after an anonymous tipster within the agency filed a report on Nov. 18, 2014.
The TSA had no explanation as to why it took them three months to investigate the claim.
Thus far, no criminal charges have been filed against either of the employees, as no victim has come forward.